Like so many space documentaries, 'Objectif Mars' gives audiences a unique glimpse into the challenges of human spaceflight. The series of personal videos from the International Space Station (ISS) and the well-rounded historical research into the risks to human spaceflight are not only educational but easily accessible by a common general audience. However, the titular focus of the film suggests an exploration of what would necessitate human spaceflight to Mars. Instead, the narrative body follows more of a historical discussion of ISS space missions told through personal anecdotes by astronaut Thomas Pesquet and accompanying secondary interviews. With a relatively short run time (93 minutes), the documentary argues that the strides in human spaceflight need to be vastly improved before a human mission to Mars can take place. But the execution of that message becomes lost in an underdeveloped narrative arc consisting of seemingly tangential sub-stories and conflicting narratives, which cause a disjointed delivery of the thematic content and leave the audience at times wondering to what end the narrative is progressing.
Directed by French filmmakers Vincent Perazio and Alain Tixier, and written by Emilie Dumond and Thomas Marlier, 'Objectif Mars' is a standard-structured performative documentary. Performative lies in the sense that it follows French astronaut Thomas Pesquet's personal experiences from his first mission to the International Space Station to explore the wider issues and risks pertaining to human spaceflight and a potential future mission to Mars.
Opening with a sequence of Pesquet climbing the volcanic slopes of Lanzarote, the film seems to promise a unique approach to a more cinematic style of documentary storytelling, setting the scene with a visual feel of a Martian-like landscape. But following the title placard, the focus shifts back and forth between accounts of the ISS Proxima mission and scientific analyses of human spaceflight risks through historical footage and interviews, only seldomly connecting the discussed material back to a topic or application of Mars exploration. In fact, any discussion surrounding Mars is fleeting and inconsistent. Many times, imperative information seems to be glossed over, such as the analysis of propulsion systems necessary for deep space missions, the Mars500 analog study, and the brief discussion of the Martian geographical landscape and its ties to an astrobiological search for life. In its place, less pertinent information that depicts in-depth surveys of the ISS is added but without any obvious or objectively stated connection to the titular Mars topic.
While this documentary does have commendable attributes such as its complete and detailed scientific content and pedagogical approach to communicating space, it takes a rather standard cinematic style and easily falls into the common tropes that are rather overused in documentary filmmaking. The use of photographic Ken Burns effects and objective-styled, secondary interviews with subjects framed through the rule of thirds are commonplace attributes that provide little visual stimulation for the audience. Further, the film suffers from "shoot the money" pitfalls of showcasing b-roll of exotic locations, like the prolonged footage of Pesquet's EVA on the ISS, which neither drive the story nor add pertinent value to the topical focus of the narrative.
Overall, 'Objectif Mars' is a sometimes entertaining and quite educational documentary in its scientific and near-Earth mission appointments, but the missteps in its narrative thematic flow bring into question its true intentions of what it is aiming to achieve in terms of Mars exploration.
